remembering a muse
i had an english professor in college who, when i was 19 year old, was exactly who i wanted to be. she was crunchy and well-read. she hadn’t cut her hair in who knows how many years and had to move it over her shoulder so that she could sit… on her desk with her legs crossed and shoes off. she lived in a van with her husband who was a painter. we were allowed to call her by her first name.
i remember her crooked teeth. they were the cute kind of crooked. her teeth added to her eclectic nature and personality. she loved her job as a teacher. she made sure to tell us that nearly every day in class. i remember loving that she did that. it made me feel important, needed even, like she needed ME in her class in order to love her job.
her last name is one of my favorite words in the english language, inspiring in itself. i felt like it was meant to be that i was in her class, with her teaching me, with her badass last name, long hair, weird ensembles, van-living lifestyle.
i really looked up to her.
it wasn’t too long after that first semester of my sophomore year in college that i was raped. i had only been in her classroom for mere weeks before i took a week off in an attempt to figure out how the hell to go on with my life. i remember missing her class during that week. missing her. i remember worrying that she would think i was one of those slacker students who didn’t give a shit about english or any other class for that matter.
english was the only class i ever cared about in school.
in those few weeks of being in her classroom, i felt like myself. i felt like i was just beginning to tap into this writer that i longed to become. there had been teachers prior to this college professor who had impacted me and my writing in various ways, but this was different. i was an adult now, making my own decisions, figuring out who i wanted to be.
until it was all taken from me. i was taken from me. and i didn’t go to her class for a solid week.
i went to my other classes, for the most part. i didn’t care about those classes. i showed up for attendance and then stared at the dry erase boards until i was dismissed. but her class, i couldn’t make myself go. it hurt too much. i cared about that class.
eventually my fear of her thinking that i was a slacker student got the better of me and i showed up in her classroom. i didn’t participate that day, but i was there physically speaking.
i remember her asking me to stay after the rest of the class had been dismissed. it was clear she wanted to know where i had been. it was as though she knew i cared about this class and she was confused. as soon as the last student left the classroom, my eyes welled-up with tears.
i told her why i hadn’t been in class. i told her i was raped. she listened. she held my hand. she gave me tissues. she was the first person, aside from family and paul, that i had said those words to out loud.
it was real.
and when i was done talking, when i was more focused on blowing my nose than spilling my guts, she looked as though she had something to say. when she was certain she had my eyes and undivided attention, she said two words that have stuck with me for over a decade.
“me too.”
and then she wept. and i wept with her. i wasn’t alone. she wasn’t alone.
that week was her last week of teaching our class. she said that she had some demons to deal with and she quit without notice. for a while, i worried that it was my fault she left.
it wasn’t. who knows how long she had buried her story… a story she hadn’t even shared with her husband. her story needed to be told, but gently and in time. her story needed her full attention. it wasn’t my fault that she left. it was just time.
i wonder about her a lot. i hope she has made her peace. and i really hope she is happy.
Hindsight
I originally wrote this post to run over at Band Back Together, which it will tomorrow, along with many others who will share their memories and honor 9/11 in their own way.
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Paul and I had been together for 3 years when 9/11 took place. Long distance relationships are hard, but we did it all through college and grad school (flight school for him). I’d like to think it made us stronger over the years.
A lot of things have made us stronger over the 12 + years that we have been together.
I woke up that Tuesday morning, a junior in college, searching for a clean pair of jeans to wear to a composition class that I was already late for. I lived with 3 other girls, 1 of whom was already in class, the other two were making coffee and watching Matt Lauer.
My bedroom was in the back of the apartment. I had the smallest bedroom, because I was the last roommate to join in on the living arrangements. I had more privacy but much less space. My dresser had to go out in the hallway so I could have room to walk in my room.
When I went in the hallway that morning to get my jeans, I heard one of my roommates repeating “ohmygod. ohmygod. ohmygod.” Granted, my roommate had a tendency to be a bit dramatic, but the tone of her voice concerned me. I’ve received enough middle-of-the-night phone calls with bad news to know what her tone meant as she said, “ohmygod” over and over again.
Zipping up my jeans, I made my way into the kitchen, which opened up to our living room, our main communal space. One roommate was watching the coffee drip into the pot, while the other roommate (the “ohmygod” roommate) sat on the couch with a box of Kleenex and an empty mug.
Not much was being said on tv at that time. The first tower had been hit. Everyone was stunned, shocked, confused. I curled up on the couch next to my roommate and we held hands. I didn’t ask any questions because what I saw on the television was more than my brain was able to compute at that moment. So we just sat with each other, hand in hand, with tears running down our cheeks.
My roommate who had been waiting for the next pot of coffee, sniffled and wiped her face before coming over to us on the couch and filling up all of our mugs. She then left for class.
It was shortly after she began her walk to class that the second tower was hit. Our gasps were audible. Loud even. As we sat on the couch, nearly in one another’s laps, we cried hard together. The phone in our apartment started to ring, but neither of us answered it. It was like we were waiting for a third plane.
I had not seen the first tower get hit at 8:52 that morning, but I witnessed the second tower being hit on live tv, and as I watched people leap from windows of the towers to their death, I felt physically ill with helplessness.
People tell you that there’s always something you can do. Something that can be done… whether it’s to right a wrong or fix something that has been broken. I grew up being taught to keep trying. There’s always something that can be done. But on this day, there was nothing. Absolutely nothing that any of us could do at that moment in time. And that is a horrific feeling.
I called my mom as my roommate and I kept our eyes glued to the television, waiting to see what would happen next. I remember worrying about my dad who travels during the work week. I could never keep track of what major city he was in when. Thankfully my dad not in NYC that day and was safe.
I emailed Paul as soon as I saw that the Pentagon had been hit. Our long distance relationship and the sheer horror of that morning had my anxiety through the roof. While I was at school in Auburn, Alabama, Paul was in school in Maryland, at the US Naval Academy.
For a while, my thoughts bounced back and forth from watching the live coverage on tv, witnessing the gravity of what was taking place in NYC, and then panicking that Paul’s safety was in jeopardy being at a military academy. After the Pentagon was hit, I worried for him in ways that my heart was not prepared for as a 20 year old kid.
Eventually Paul was able to call me from a payphone. He reassured me that he was safe. The Academy had been on lock-down and all gates were barricaded with armed guards. The reality of what was happening that day finally hit during that phone call with him.
The terror that I had witnessed that morning while sitting on the couch with my roommate had been brought directly into my life when the Pentagon was hit and the love of my life was a mere 45 minutes away, in Annapolis.
My heart broke for the families who searched for missing loved ones… families forced to bury those who were much too young to be taken. My soul grew with pride when I later heard of the sacrifices made by the passengers on United 93. And my body ached to hug Paul and tangibly feel that he was safe.
As paralyzing as that day was 10 years ago, I credit 9/11 for solidifying in my heart who I was meant to spend the rest of my life with. I suppose sometimes it literally takes a world tragedy to make you realize what you want out of life.
reach
he grows during his naps.
rooting himself deeper into the soil while reaching for the sun at the same time.
we read a story together. i cover the words. he turns the pages. we laugh.
the end. close the book. a few minutes to snuggle.
i turn the light out, adjust the blinds in his room.
his arms are held out towards me. i pull the sheets up and tuck his “friends” in next to him, lay his blankey across.
a hug. a kiss. comb his hair with one hand.
whisper in his ear.
mommy loves jackson.
a quick time later, he wakes to come find me.
ready for a new adventure. a game. a movie. a puzzle. a ride in the car.
stretching in the daylight.
demands. requests. desires.
full sentences that blow my mind.
mom, i’d like some juice pleeeeaaaase?
i try to listen. and on my good days, i’m able to accomplish that task.
on my not-so-good-days i yearn for him to listen to me.
as a baby, the demands were inexplicably hard.
and constant. and loud.
the whimpers that crescendo into cries and then wails and deafening screams.
tears and rain drops.
whisper in his ear.
mommy loves jackson.
and somehow he hears that. the whisper resonates.
i feel his physical release of grief.
then i can breathe.
the tee-shirt creeps up his belly as he sleeps.
when he wakes, smelling of sleepy sweat, it looks two sizes too small.
because it is.
he stretches higher this time.
i forget too often that i am growing with him.
google + and the status of social media
(alternately titled: jenny p.)
surely everyone had a jenny p. at some point in their young academic career.
definition of jenny p: male or female, physically attractive to many, is whatever age you wished you could be because then you would be cool, and sets the trend for the entire school throughout the entire school year.
you wanted to be jenny p. (though it pains you to admit that, even years later). in fact, you yearned to be jenny p. everyone wanted her and to some extent you felt like you needed her. if she doesn’t show up at school, people notice. if she fails a test, you offer to tutor her.
because… if you lay down and beg for long enough, you’re bound to get an invitation, SOME RECOGNITION.
doesn’t matter if it’s a pity-invite.
it counts.
and that recognition, that invitation to the party or the seat next to jenny p. in class meant that you may have a shot, at being someone.
other than yourself. better than yourself.
with people. and power.
(if you can’t think of who your jenny p. was, then chances are you were her.)
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my jenny p. was incredible. absolutely fucking incredible. she was the helen of troy of 1993.
SHE HAD BOOBS.
the vast majority of middle school girls do one of two things: you either pray to get your period so that you could say you were officially a woman… or, you pray that no one would find out that you started your period when you were 9 years old because if someone found out that you’ve been menstruating for THAT LONG, you were strange.
you NEVER wanted jenny p. to think of you as strange.
you watched her, mesmerized and entranced by her status.
you watched her, not wanting to miss out on anything.
and… you felt yourself start to genuinely care for her.
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i wanted to fight the power then.
i want to fight the power now.
and yet, i submit… because i’m human and imperfect.
ya know what? so is jenny p.
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i thought i was a late comer to blogging a few years ago. i was one who read blogs for a long time before starting my own. sure, i had a live journal but no one ever knew about it. i had a myspace page only because everyone else did.
even now, after doing this for almost 4 years, i still feel like i’m learning.
i’m noticeably younger than most of those i admire, correspond with, trust.
for a while, i thought there was something that i was missing about blogging. something that other bloggers understood that i didn’t.
TELL ME YOUR SECRET.
it’s not me who doesn’t get it. i get it. i have this space, this twitter account, this about.me page, this facebook account, a pinterest page, and as of last week, i was added to google +.
someone deemed me worth of an invite.
someone placed me in their circle.
ME.
and as much as i would like to say, it doesn’t fucking matter. i’m a creative. i don’t need the NEXT BEST THING. i have my words. i have my quill and my parchment, i can’t say that.
because it does matter. all of it matters.
or so it seems.
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when we find ourselves at the place of desiring recognition, power, notoriety, FAME, do we find that we really want to be there? was that our intention? do we then feel heard?
i don’t know…
but that doesn’t mean that my heart didn’t skip a beat when i saw i had been added to jenny p.’s google + circle.
not even age can take away one’s desire to be wanted by others.
Have a Sip
